You are an Exile, struggling to survive on the dark continent of Wraeclast, as you fight to earn power that will allow you to exact your revenge against those who wronged you. Created by hardcore gamers, Path of Exile is an online Action RPG set in a dark fantasy world.

March 29

The one month Torment/Bloodlines events are going well. Many players have earned pieces of the exclusive Cerulean and Sanguine Seraph Armour sets. There are still over three weeks left in the events, so plenty of time for you to earn your armour sets too! Today's news post includes some statistics of how many armour pieces have been earned and a compilation of player deaths from the Hardcore league.
Users who have completed:

About This Game

You are an Exile, struggling to survive on the dark continent of Wraeclast, as you fight to earn power that will allow you to exact your revenge against those who wronged you. Created by hardcore gamers, Path of Exile is an online Action RPG set in a dark fantasy world. With a focus on visceral action combat, powerful items and deep character customization, Path of Exile is completely free and will never be pay-to-win.

Key Features

Freedom. Power. Revenge.Banished for your misdeeds to the dark, brutal world of Wraeclast, you play as the Duelist, Witch, Ranger, Templar, Marauder, Shadow or the Scion class. From forsaken shores through to the ruined city of Sarn, explore Wraeclast and uncover the ancient secrets waiting for you.

Deadly MissionsThe Forsaken Masters each have their own style of mission and each of these missions has many variations. As you explore deeper into Wraeclast, the pool of available variations increases to challenge you in new ways. All of the Missions and their variations can occur anywhere in the game, including within end-game Maps.

Dressed to KillPath of Exile is all about items. Find, collect and trade magic, rare and unique items with arcane properties, then customize your character build around the deadliest combinations you possess.

Brutal Competitive PlayBattle in PvP tournaments seasons and Capture the Flag events for worldwide recognition. Compete in Daily Leagues and Race Events that run as separate game worlds with their own ladders and economies to win valuable prizes.

Customise Your Hideout​In their extensive travels throughout Wraeclast, the Forsaken Masters have discovered ideal locations for an Exile to use as their own secret Hideout. Once you've earned a Master's trust, you may be taken to a Hideout, where you can create your own personalised town. Masters residing in your Hideout offer you daily Missions and train you in advanced crafting options. Use your Hideout as a quiet place to craft after battle, or expand it and use it as a personalised Guild Hall with hundreds of decorations.

Fair-To-Play. Never Pay-To-Win. We're committed to creating a fair playing field for all players. You cannot gain gameplay advantage by spending real money in Path of Exile.

Simply the most in-depth Hack'n'Slash out there and the best according to me. Character customization is top-notch and replayability is huge. I have a little bit over 1k hours played on it (did not link the game to my steam account immediately) and I still have many things to discover. However, it is a "hardcore game" less accessible than Diablo 3 or others games.

Pros:- Huge passive skill tree offering in-depth character customisation- Interesting spell customisation using gems (close to FFVII's materia system)- Interesting trading system relying on barter only (no gold or any other in-game currency)- Interesting crafting system allowing to modify dropped items- Game is very skill based (rare for a hack'n'slash!)- Very little Faceroll/OP builds, almost every build has drawbacks and strength

Cons:- Can be hard to get into: trading system can seem overwhelming and in-game mechanics are quite complicated so use of the wiki and forum is much advised- Animation can seem clunky at the beginning and game seems to play slow at the beginning- Player can feel like reaching a gear-ceiling at the beginning of end-game if playign self-found (much better since Forsaken Master's 1.2 update though)- Will eat your life if you get into it...

You look so familiar...Diablo? Is it you?No, you're not him but you look so similar.The dark and brownish color of the land.The hellish color of the blood.Evil is everywhere.Every footsteps land on a tombstone.Your forsaken master sent you on a painful path.You've been in exile for years.Now you're back to claim your title.Lord of Hack and slash.

It is rare to find a Free-to-Play game that ends up Free-to-Enjoy. Path of Exile is not only available to people of all wallet sizes, it ultimately manages to best it's AAA compettitors.Diablo 3 is dead.Long live the new king.

This is probably one of the most in depth ARPGs I have ever played, and its free to play! The character customization in this game is absolutely crazy. The game may seem daunting at first with its unique currency system and absolutely huge skill tree but once you learn how these works you will get addicted to this game.

Now lets look at the Pros and Cons. I will list them in a very detailed manner. TLDR version will be at the bottom for those of you that just a brief look because this is going to be a long one.

Pros:

+This game is free to play. And when I say free to play I don't mean free to play and buy your way to the top. There is no way possible to buy any sort of advantage in-game. The only things you can buy are visual armor sets that can be applied to your in-game items, alternate skill visuals, pets that do not fight, more character slots (which you have about 24 slots to start with), and extra stash tabs (which again you start with plenty space).

+Character Customization is amazing. There are 7 classes. Marauder, templar, witch, shadow, ranger, duelist, and scion(has to be unlocked by completing normal mode). All of these classes lean toward certain builds but if you wanted to play the strength heavy marauder as an int caster then that is very possible. The skill tree is huge and any class can go in any direction. It may seem daunting at first but once you learn your way around its fun to plan out the rest of your build or your next character.

+Unique currency system. This is one of my favorite things about the game. In this game you don't have gold or anything like it. Instead you buy and sell things with orbs. There are many types of orbs with varying rarity. I won't go over all the orbs but I'll talk about a few as an example. For instance, the orb of chance can change a white common item into a magic, rare, or even unique item (the different rarities, think magic as uncommon, rare as well rare, and unique as legendary). Or say a chaos orb which can change the properties of a rare item. Orbs like these can be traded to npcs for items or upgrades in your hideout(I'll explain this later). Or players will buy and sell items using these orbs. So you can use these orbs as currency or to upgrade your own gear.

+Leagues. This game has a couple permanent leagues as well as temporary leagues. The 2 perma leagues are standard and hardcore. Standard is pretty simple. There are 3 acts in 3 game modes at the time this review is written (I believe a 4th act is coming next year). In normal you suffer no penalty at death. In the next difficulty, which you access by beating all acts on normal, is a little more punishing. In cruel if you die you lose 5% of your experience (don't worry you can't lose a level if you are at less than 5% exp for that level). In the last difficulty, merciless, you lose 10% experience for death. In the hardcore league if your character dies at all it is moved to standard league.

Each league can only share a stash with characters in the same league. GGG also releases temporary leagues. The big highlight of this is their 3 month leagues. These are good for providing a fresh start and for people who enjoy tring to race to the top first can do so. It also lets players play in a fresh economy. When they release these 3 month leagues they release of them. One of them is a Standard league and the other hardcore.

However, these aren't copy-paste modes. The 3 month leagues have something exta to them that the perma leagues don't have. For example, at the time of this review the torment(standard) and bloodline(hardcore) leagues are going on. In torment there are tormented souls that fly around making enemies stronger but they drop better loot. In bloodlines there are enemies who gain synergetic abilities that make them way stronger. And with these temp leagues they also have access to several new unique items that the perma leagues won't have access to until the temp leagues are over. If a character dies in bloodline they will be moved to standard league.

+The developers care about this game. This one is pretty simple. They update the game a lot. There's always new things coming into this game. You can even spot GGG staff members from time to time talking to people in global chat. It is very obvious that they care about this game and its community.

+Gems. Gems are what you will use for all of your skills. There are red (strength) gems, blue (int) gems, and green (dex) gems. You can get these gems by questing or by finding them as random drops. To use these gems you have to put them in the correct colored socket that your gear has. If your gear doesn't have enough sockets or the wrong color sockets then that's okay, you can manipulate this with the use of orbs. For example, the chromatic orb can change all the socket colors on a piece of gear and the jewelers orb can change th number of sockets on gear. Your gems also gain experience just as you do. The higher level the gem, the better. Gems have a max level of 20.

+Endgame. Endgame begins once you are at the end of act 3 merciless. You can get maps that drop from enemies. These maps will generate a random level with random enemies. Thats not all they will gain extra effects or maybe you will gain extra effects or lose them! The harder the map the more rewarding it is. You can also use orbs on the maps! If you have a white quality map then you can use something like an orb of alchemy which will change its quality from common to rare making it a harder but more rewarding map.

CONS

-Desync. This biggest problem with this game is that it suffers from desynchronisation problems. This means you will sometimes randomly lag back a couple seconds which can sometimes kill you. If you keep this in mind most of the time you can play carefully and this won't really effect you much.

-Starting out as a new player in this game can be rough at first. There is so much to learn and the game has a lot of depth to it. With all the skill gems, skill points, and currency orbs its hard to know what to do with everything. However there are ways to learn. The official poe website is a good place to learn more about the game. The class forums are a good place to go to see how people build their characters. People can even post the path they went on their skill tree and you can look at each node they took to help you gain an understanding at what it takes to make a decent character.

-This game can also be a little bit boring getting to end game if leveling isn't really your thing. You have to complete all 3 acts on all 3 difficulties before you make it to end game. Doing all the same quests 3 times over per character may seem a bit boring at times.

TLDR PROS

+Free to play+great character customization+fun skill system+unique currency & trading system+developers care about this game and its community a lot+geat end game+frequent updates+fun league system

TLDR CONS

-game suffers from desync-game can be rough on beginners-leveling characters through each difficulty can get tedious.

Thank you for reading. I know this review was extremely long but I just wanted to make sure I put out as much info as I could think of for people who are interested in trying this game out. I hope this review has helped you.

This game is extremely fun and I def reccommend it to anyone who likes diabloish type games. Starting out may be rough because of everything you have to learn but it is worth it if you stick through. If you have any questions please leave a comment and I will try to comment back as soon as I can!

Path of Exile is a very niche(IMO) Action RPG that is unique in more ways than it is similar to other games of the genre. High replayability, races, constant content and balance updates, and dev's that really listen to their supporters and players. This game is free, and is probably the only free to play game I've ever played that I personally believe should NOT be free. This game is easily worth at least a 20-30 dollar price tag. If you enjoyed Diablo 2 (NOT 3) then you will get more than your fair share of enjoyment from this gem of a game. 2 thumbs and big toes up!

Got leaped by Goats, rhoad from Rhoas, smashed by Vaal and touched by God.

10/10

Look at this playtime and this is only on steam statistics. I have played a bit more on the standalone client.. Iam a lost poor soul wandering in dark places.. GoodGame GGG!!

This Game really breaks it. You will come to the point where you have to deceide if you get some sleep before work or get some levels in a new league. Its very addictive and replayable for an ARPG and its straight forwarded to partyplay where you will get the most fun out of it.Hell then you might even start HC and show wreaclast the true meaning of supremacy thru insomnia.

+Tons of possible Character Builds +New skills and Uniques get implemented frequently+Music is good and got some special moments+Very strong Partyplay +New Leagues+Races+Tons of Loot and fine Uniques+Crafting improved +Hideouts for nice fast trades and showcases+Actual some kind of endgame compared to other hacknslay+Nice artwork+Nice little def team+no pay2win+f2p as it should be

-desync can be kinda annoying - otherwise its the price for having good combat mechanics and skill possibilites-it will kill your social life

Its a good co-op or solo fantasy game. It has a interesting story with fun campaigns (goals). Has great and creative enemies throughout the game. Its a fun and addictive game couldn't stop playing when I first downloaded it. If you like a fantasy game with elements, swords, archery and more of your typical fantasy game then I think this game would be for you.

Comparing D3 and PoE is like comparing summer camp and boot camp. In D3, Hi! welcome to the game! Here are bunch of stuff to get you started. Oh you killed your 1st boss? CONGRATULATIONS have some more legendary loot!! You've been playing for hours and feeling like not getting enough loot? Here! have some more legendaries!In PoE, Alright you maggots! here are some basic rules and take this piece of crap and get killing. GO! GO! GO! 1st boss kill huh? WELL WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU LOOKING AT ME FOR, DO I LOOK LIKE A FRIGGIN' CHARITY TO YOU? Get your ♥♥♥ to the next stage GO! GO! GO! What's that? you've been playing for hours and nothing good? BOO F!@KING HOO! You want uniques? You gotta grind like a cheap hooker and work like a kid in a chinese sweatshop

I guess what I'm saying is, in D3, there are lots of hand holding, nurtring and caring. While PoE will abuse you, drag you through mud, abuse you some more and then maybe, just maybe throw you a bone but for some reason, you want to keep going and keep coming back for more.

The only major issues I've had with this game is BSOD without a dedicated Sound Card which should have been taken care of awhile ago (I have a Sound Blaster Zx so I'm in the clear now), grinding hours on end for decent loot, and the most notable desync issues. Other than that, great hardcore ARPG at its finest.

An excellent game, before you take into consideration the fact that it's completely free. When you add that and the fact that this is a rare free-to-play which isn't pay to win with developpers that have an outstanding work ethic, it becomes amazing.

Not only is the game good, but it keeps getting better. It's a bit hard to get into with its daunting passive skill grid and obscure currency system, but the huge and very helpful community makes the introduction a breeze. This is quite simply the best hack & slash arpg I have ever played (and I've spent a lot of time on those since Diablo 1).

Very engrossing game. Played it when it was still open beta and it has held my interest since. Constant updates and devs that care about the community too. Lots of build diversity and very fun gameplay. Not to mention free to play. I don't think I've played a game this much since Diablo 2. 10/10 Need life back please

I've dumped about 13 hours so far into this game, and I am loving it. I came here from Diablo 3, as endgame in D3 got stale and the rewarding feeling of getting epic loot went away for me. Path of Exile's skill system was overwhelming but such a pleasant surprise for me as I LOVE theorycrafting fun builds. The graphics aren't bad and the environments are beautiful and dark and immersive. It also gives you a total sense of freedom and you play how you desire. Some builds are more end-game viable than others but that does not mean you can't have your fun as you level a few chars and learn whats good and whats not. But the realy selling point: IT'S FREE. PLAY THIS GAME. NAOOOO.

Do you want an amazing Action RPG, with great graphics, insane atmosphere, has lots of fun and loot, lots of blood too, and don't want do spend a single cent to play it?Then, why isn't Path of Exile installed on your PC yet?

Got leaped by Goats, rhoad from Rhoas, smashed by Vaal and touched by the God.

+ Huge passive skill tree offering in-depth character customisation+ Interesting spell customisation using gems+ Interesting trading system relying on barter only+ Well balanced (Very little Faceroll/OP builds, almost every build has drawbacks and strength)+ Game is very skill based+ New skills and Uniques get implemented frequently+ Music is good and got some special moments+ Very strong party play + New Leagues+ Races+ Tons of Loot and fine Uniques+ Crafting+ Hideouts for nice fast trades and showcases+ Actual some kind of endgame compared to other hacknslay+ Nice artwork+ No pay2win+ F2P as it should be